Anti-social behaviour in social housing (England)

Published Friday, August 23, 2019

This briefing paper provides an overview of the remedies available to social landlords to deal with tenants who exhibit anti-social behaviour. The paper focuses on England but some of the same legislation applies in Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland operate under different legislative regimes. The Home Office updated guidance for frontline professionals dealing with ASB in August 2019.

Are landlords liable for their anti-social tenants?

As a rule, landlords are not responbile for the anti-social behaviour of their tenants. Section 1 of this paper outlines some legal cases that have tested this proposition.

Social landlords' policies and procedures

All social landlords should have a published policy on anti-social behaviour which sets out how they will react and tackle reported instances of anti-social behaviour. The starting point for a tenant of a social landlord who is suffering from anti-social behaviour is, therefore, to obtain a copy of the landlord’s policy on anti-social behaviour. If a landlord is failing to implement their policy this may form the basis of a complaint. More detail is provided in section 2 of the paper.

Remedies

Social landlords have a number of powers at their disposal to tackle anti-social tenants. The ultimate sanction is the eviction of the tenant but most landlords will seek to remedy the situation before it reaches that stage.

A number of new powers were introduced by the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. The Home Office published guidance on the new powers: Statutory guidance for frontline professionals which was revised in August 2019 "in the light of experience since the new powers were introduced".

The type of remedies that social landlords can employ include: dispute resolution; injunctions; introductory and demoted tenancies; and eviction. More detail is provided in section 3 of the paper.